Izu, Home of the Wasabi

The train ride took us to Izu. This is an area famous for the Wasabi farms. One of the main tourist attractions in the area is this big hill that you can ride a cable car up to and take a view of the whole valley.



Below is Kevin. Kevin is afraid of heights. Deathly afraid. Can you tell???



At the top of the mountain was a guy selling Mochis. These are made from Rice and are kind of like a sticky cake. They are pink because the flavoring of it is Sakura or Cherry Blossoms! (From the trees I posted earlier). It has a unique flowery flavor. We had to try one of course!

You can walk around the rim of the hill. I think it's probably a 1.5km walk. There is actually a "Bowl"in the middle like a volcano. Below is a picture of the bowl.

But if you look closely into the bowl... you realize that there's an archery range there! Sweet! I kind of wanted to give it a shot.

This is how you get into the bowl. You have to carry your arrows, your bow, down these stairs. And then when you're done you have to walk back up! It is a long way down! The group decided that they did not want to do this :).

Below is a picture of me at the top of the hill. Behind me is the valley and the coast line. The wind was blowing strong and it was COLD up here which is why I was wearing my leather jacket. The wind actually gave me quite a headache!

Another picture of the view from the top.

At the souvenier store we found "Hello Kitty Izu!". This is when I realized that every region in Japan had a specialized hello kitty that is for sale only in Japan, and only in that region. This particular hello kitty is supposedly holding a Wasabi root, and tasting it (which is why she has that funny expression on her face.)

But if you ask me, it looks like she's holding a giant green Dildo, Flipping you off, and squinting her eyes at you in disdain. What do you think??? :)

The Train! The Train!

This was my first long train ride in Japan. We were on our way to Izu. We picked up some Bento lunch boxes for the ride. Below is the one that I got. Yes, those are disposable lunch boxes. Aren't they kind of intricate??


Here's what was inside. Yes it's kind of jumbled up because I started digging through it before I realized i should have taken a picture first :) Oh well. You have fish cakes, fish, bamboo, mochi, plums, rice balls, some meat, carrots, and condiments! It was quite good!


Below is a picture of my friend's lunch box. They sure spend a lot of attention to their presentation! Everything from the Bentos to Snack foods come wrapped in fancy packages.

This is Kevin's lunch. He went for a burger and sandwhich! Boooo!!!!

This is the view out the window of the train! There's so much water in Japan that many of the train rides had scenic vistas of the ocean, lakes, streams, or rivers!



Below is a picture of a small bay that we passed by on our way to Izu!
The next trip post will be about Izu! Home of the Wasabi!

Rain, Rain, Go Away!

After the fish market we were scheduled to visit Ueno park. This is a famous park in Tokyo where they do "Hanami" or flower watching.

April is the month when the Sakura, or Cherry Blossoms, bloom. This happens once per year. After it blooms the flower petals will float to the ground throughout the day covering the ground in pink, or white flower petals. Once all the petals fall (they all fall in less than 1 week!) the tree is left bare for the rest of the year.

It's the national tree of Japan, so april is a special month. People come out to sit under the trees, have lunch, drink sake, and enjoy themselves.

Unfortunately for us the first day of bloom it was raining quite hard, so the petals that would normally be blanketing the ground were wet and smooshed. No one was out sitting under the trees either!

Since the sky was cloudy the pictures didn't turn out too nice. Plus it was hard taking pictures with one hand while holding an umbrella in the other! So this time around i didn't grab too many pics. Here is a shot of one of the trees.

We actually lucked out for the 3 weeks we were there. We started in the warmer region and progressed through colder regions each week. The trees bloom later when it is colder -- so we ended up seeing the trees in full bloom for all 3 weeks of the trip!

I actually have better pictures of the sakura coming up in the later posts. But, I'm posting in chronological order.

This was the last week for some of the people in our group. So they needed more bags to carry souvenirs home. We found this bag shop in the park where you can get them for about $10.00 each!

Now, i saw this sign on a bag. It's written in Japanese and I was instantly drawn to it! I can't quite figure out why, but I wanted to buy this bag :D.

I pointed it out to my Japanese speaking friend and he said, "What? I don't see anything weird!"

Is it just me???

The First Morning

The first day I arrive, we decide to go to the Tsujiki fish market. It opens early in the morning so we woke up at 5:00am to get there on time! That was quite a feat for me for anyone that knows me!

The fish market is a gigantic warehouse. Imagine an area of a couple walmarts. Except all the merchandise is seafood! Inside there are carts, weird drum-cars (see the video), and people running around like mad to bring the daily catch in.

1. View from the center of the market

2. Doesn't he look friendly?

3. A bunch of little Fishies!

4. Tuna is Expensive!
5. Lobster! Yummy!

6. Shrimp to throw at Jordan!

7. Clams!

Here is a short walk-through video I took in the market:

After the fish market we decided to visit a sushi bar next door to have breakfast! Mmmm Jordan and Flat Coke this is what you can enjoy if you come visit us :)

We wanted to get the freshest items so we told the Sushi chef to order the items for us. We got a few items that we never had before. Here's some of the selection we had (I didnt take a picture of all of them):

1. Sweet Shrimp (Ama Ebi)

2. Another type of Shrimp

3. Sea Urchin!

4. I think it's Clam...

5. The salmon was only $1.50! Cindy would love it!

6. Baked Eel. Jordan can Handle this!

7. Don't know what it is!

8. I think it's squid tentacles!

Everything tasted great and was super fresh! I forgot to take a picture of the Salmon eggs. But for anyone that's had them before in the U.S. they are usually extremely salty. The ones here were not salty at all and they were great! It may be because they are fresh and don't need to be preserved? I'm not quite sure why.

We had quite a few items that we weren't quite sure what it was. This won't be the last time that happens either!

So... Did this post make you hungry???